ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2020
Cretaceous origins of the vibrotactile bill-tip organ in birds.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
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10 citing papers in PubMed, 21 citations in OpenAlex.
- Post-hatching development of the remote-tactile bill-tip organ in precocial shorebirds (Scolopacidae).Journal of anatomy · 2026Article
- Avian features ofInnovation (Cambridge (Mass.)) · 2026Article
- Insights into the early evolution of modern avian physiology from fossilized soft tissues from the Mesozoic.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Ecological insights on the feeding behaviour of waterbirds in an Important Bird and Biodiversity Area of South West Johor Coast, Malaysia.Biodiversity data journal · 2025Article
- Tactile bill-tip organs in seabirds suggest conservation of a deep avian symplesiomorphy.Biology letters · 2024Article
- Palaeoecological deductions from osteohistology.Biology letters · 2023Review
- Recent developments in parrot cognition: a quadrennial update.Animal cognition · 2023Review
- Comparative morphology and soft tissue histology of the remote-touch bill-tip organ in three ibis species of differing foraging ecology.Journal of anatomy · 2022Article
- Comparative Genomics Provides Insights into Adaptive Evolution in Tactile-Foraging Birds.Genes · 2022Article
- Cretaceous origins of the vibrotactile bill-tip organ in birds.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2020Article
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3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
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No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Some probe-foraging birds locate their buried prey by detecting mechanical vibrations in the substrate using a specialized tactile bill-tip organ comprising mechanoreceptors embedded in densely clustered pits in the bone at the tip of their beak. This remarkable sensory modality is known as 'remote touch', and the associated bill-tip organ is found in probe-foraging taxa belonging to both the palaeognathous (in kiwi) and neognathous (in ibises and shorebirds) clades of modern birds. Intriguingly, a structurally similar bill-tip organ is also present in the beaks of extant, non-probing palaeognathous birds (e.g. emu and ostriches) that do not use remote touch. By comparison with our comprehensive sample representing all orders of extant modern birds (Neornithes), we provide evidence that the lithornithids (the most basal known palaeognathous birds which evolved in the Cretaceous period) had the ability to use remote touch. This finding suggests that the occurrence of the vestigial bony bill-tip organ in all modern non-probing palaeognathous birds represents a plesiomorphic condition. Furthermore, our results show that remote-touch probe foraging evolved very early among the Neornithes and it may even have predated the palaeognathous-neognathous divergence. We postulate that the tactile bony bill-tip organ in Neornithes may have originated from other snout tactile specializations of their non-avian theropod ancestors.
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